Scott Witthoff : 00:03 What's hard about the first 50 miles of
dirty Kansas is you're in a group of 50 guys and women. You're
surrounded by folks all around you and you. It's really difficult
to drink. Craig Dalton: 00:22 That was this week's guest Scott
Whitthoff two time, age group winner at Dirty Kanza, talking about
the first 15 miles of DK200. This week we talk about West Coast
versus Midwest gravel and as always we'll talk about a few more
events that you should have on your riding bucket list. Announcer :
00:38 Welcome to the gravel ride. Your go to podcast about the
people, places and products that defined gravel cycling. Here's
your host, Craig Dalton. Craig Dalton: 00:51 Welcome to the pod.
Scott, I really appreciate you making the time to come talk to us
today. Yeah, it's good to be here. So I know you from just General
San Francisco cycling and and mainly like that epic ride you do on
Saturdays, but can you tell me a little bit about your background
as a cyclist? Scott Witthoff : 01:07 So I'm born and raised in
Lincoln, Nebraska. In High School I had some classmates that I
really looked up to. They race every Saturday and they come to
class on Monday morning showing off their eighty / hundred dollar
cash winnings. I was like, what is that? You know, what do you get
that for? And they're a big bike racers. So I got started when I
was probably 16 years old. Craig Dalton: 01:33 That's a long
journey in the sport. Scott Witthoff : 01:35 Yeah. And then I
slowly kind of discovered that I wasn't a great cyclist. I was just
average and um, I wasn't meant to be a bike racer and uh, I was on
a cross country and track team, so picked up swimming and I turned
into a little triathlete. Hate to say it, but that's sort of
already my early days of cycling. I was kind of a triathlete. Craig
Dalton: 02:01 We won't shame you for that. So then, you know, onto
the subject of gravel writing. It sounds like from talking to you
earlier that you discovered riding on dirt quite early, just by
nature, that terrain that was around your home. Scott Witthoff :
02:16 I felt like I lived out in the country in Lincoln, lived on a
small lake in the winter months. The group of guys I would ride
with, we would spend a lot of time riding gravel roads. We would
just head out and ride 20 miles, maybe 30 miles straight into a
headwind and then turn around and ride back. That's kind of what
you do in the Midwest. You wherever the winds out of you ride in
straight into that headwind. And then have a tailwind coming back.
Craig Dalton: 02:44 And were you just writing your regular road
bike out on those rides Scott Witthoff : 02:46 in the winter wheat.
Then we'd try to ride a road bikes as much as possible. And then we
slowly started riding her mountain bikes. That was more the, that
fast forwarding a little bit. That was around 1987. I got my first
mountain bike and I love riding on my mountain bike. Um, so that
was, but up until 87I only road my road bike on the gravel also.
Lincoln has really hard pack gravel so it's pretty fast and it's
not too loose. And different states like Kansas, you need to be on
like more of a mountain bike or a gravel bike. Craig Dalton: 03:29
Gotcha. But you've been living out in the bay area for a while and
obviously like the gravel racing and riding scene has really become
popular over the last, let's call it five or six years. Were there
elements of the equipment that you saw evolve that really made it
come back into your life in earnest? Scott Witthoff : 03:48 I feel
like last weekend was the Grasshopper, a Old Caz, which you were
there and we had a, like it was an absolute blast. Racing that
years ago on with cantilever brakes. Um, if it's muddy or I don't
know, it just feels like disc brakes have really changed the
ability to run a fatter tire nowadays on these gravel bikes is
wonderful. Being able to put a 40 millimeter tire on your bike is
pretty wonderful. Craig Dalton: 04:17 I think it's huge. I'm
excited to talk to you because you're one of the few guys I know
who has experience midwest gravel riding and gravel riding here in
Marin County and northern California. So I'm, I'm curious to
explore that a little bit and you know, maybe one way to do that is
to talk about your experience at Dirty Kanza because here I guess
it's three time veteran of that event in two time age group,
winner. So I think your insights are going to be really fascinating
on that. Scott Witthoff : 04:45 First off, that's an amazing race.
It's, it's truly a community when you go back there and I look
forward to going back to see friends and and see a lot of bay area
people that travel all the way to Kansas. So he seemed so out of
place. When you step off a plane and going to Emporia Kansas,
you're like holy cow, look at all these people from all over all
over the US Craig Dalton: 05:08 What inspired you to do it for the
first time three years ago? Scott Witthoff : 05:11 There were some
folks, some guys that I used to ride within Lincoln, Nebraska that
had been doing it. One Guy, he, he's done 10 of them. I've always
wanted to go do it, but I've been so intimidated by that distance.
It's hard to wrap your head around 200 miles. Once you do it, it's.
It turns out it's not as hard to wrap your head around once you
complete your first one Craig Dalton: 05:38 Given the type of
terrain we have out here in Marin county, which is a lot of ups and
downs in a sustained fashion, so you know you're climbing 800 feet
or a thousand feet to translate that to more that the rolling hills
in the Midwest. It is a bit of a disconnect on how you train for
it. Can you talk a little bit how you train for it and how you got
head around it and how that actually translated when you were on
the dirt? Scott Witthoff : 06:04 I did a lot of Saturday and
Sunday, big, big blocks of training and I don't like to call it
training. It just. I grab a group of friends and we go out and we
do big Saturday ride on pavement and then maybe Sunday followed up
with another big day, maybe two really big six hour days on the
bike. You need to do some training off road just to get your upper
body used to all the, the abuse that it will take because it's
pounding on the handlebars. Craig Dalton: 06:35 Over 200 Mile Day,
it's gotta be a lot of abuse. Is a different that it's sort of
smaller. Rolling Hills and then the sustained descending that we do
out here. Scott Witthoff : 06:44 I feel like what's hard about the
first 50 miles of dairy, Kansas is you're in a group of 50 guys and
women. You're surrounded by folks all around you and you. It's
really difficult to drink, to hydrate. So I think a camelback is a
must. Craig Dalton: 07:04 And did you figure that out on the first
go round or did it take to the second? I'm a huge sweater. I cramp
pretty easily if I don't have a camel back, um, I'll be in big
trouble. But the first 15 miles you're not really taking your hands
off the bars a whole lot. And then once it kind of spreads out,
then you can kind of, once you're kind of in your little group than
you're able to eat and drink and gather yourself a little bit.
Craig Dalton: 07:30 And I was surprised to learn that there was a
lot of flats at Dirty Kanza. What element of the terrain creates
that? The Flint hills of Kansas are those razor sharp rocks are.
Scott Witthoff : 07:42 I mean you see so many flat tires. Those
first 50 miles, you're also in a big group so you can't eat or you
might not be taking the best line. You might have to follow
somebody. And sometimes I find myself trying to drift back a little
bit to give myself some space because I've learned the hardware,
you know, just flooding a lot. It seems like I get a lot of flats.
I've kind of had to learn the hard way. I've got to drift back a
little bit and have a good side of line, you know, I can see what
I'm about to run into. Craig Dalton: 08:17 What kind of equipment
were you riding? Scott Witthoff : 08:19 I'm a big fan of the
specialized trigger. Tubeless. It's a 38 millimeter tire. Which has
good sidewall protection and does it have a knob on it? Yeah. Does
it has a great file tread like perfect for cancer. I feel like
everybody's making a great tread is just how good is the sidewall
protection. A lot of tires out there. Just don't have a lot of good
sidewall casing. Right. Craig Dalton: 08:48 It sounds like that's a
good investment if you're going to go tackle Dirty Kanza. Scott
Witthoff : 08:51 It's a heavy tire. It's really heavy. Um, I think
it's worth having a little bit higher volume tire. Craig Dalton:
09:00 Yeah. That offers a little bit more sidewall protection. So
it sounds like a couple of takeaways are. Consider camelback for
hydration just so you can stay hydrated during the first 50 miles
and obviously the later in the day as it adds up. Great tires with
good sidewalls. Last thing you want to do is make a long day even
longer with a couple of flats and then just getting out there and
then putting the mileage on however you can. And in your local, the
local terrain. Scott Witthoff : 09:26 I feel like I carry. I have
three bladders waiting for me. Each rest stop. There's only three
rest stops over the 200 miles I roll in the feed zone and I'll
quickly swap out one bladder and put it in a fresh one. Craig
Dalton: 09:44 Was that a neutral area that you'd like? They just
transported your gear bag and you found your number and you grabbed
it or did you actually have friends out there helping you? Scott
Witthoff : 09:52 Everyone needs to have their own support crew or
you can do a for hire crew, which I've done the last three years.
Um, it's a local, it's like $75. They and it's wonderful. I've
highly recommended and they're the first. You go through the timing
mat and they're the first group waiting for you, like big purple
shammy butter tent. So you can find your crew quickly and then they
have your back laying out for you. That's amazing. They call it in
and they were like, can come see, you know, Scott would off and
they've got your bag waiting for you. Craig Dalton: 10:26 I guess
that comes with being a 12 year old event versus you know, many of
the events were riding these days are, are one or two years old.
Yeah. It kind of reminds me of sort of the iron man experience
where it's just a little bit more dialed. You have to get you
through the end of what is inevitably going to be an epic day. I
mean we're talking about what a 13 hour day, which is far beyond
what most of us usually ride. Scott Witthoff : 10:51 I would gladly
open a couple more rest stops along the way. I find myself stuck in
between usually the second and third totally dehydrated. No water.
One year I had to pull off a group that I was in right up to a
farmhouse and asked for some water how to sell. Wow. That got me to
the third checkpoint. Craig Dalton: 11:14 I think what's
interesting about all these gravel events is there, you know,
they're, they're going in multiple different directions. Like
something like Dirty Kanza, which has obviously been around for a
long time, is an ultra endurance race, which is different than, you
know, the four hour races of the grasshopper series or gravel mob
or things like that. Um, and that's what I find really interesting
about the sport in general is that things things are going in
multiple different directions. And you know, I, for one, as I
mentioned earlier, like I love the idea that the festival
atmosphere, yeah, of these events that I hope regardless of how
many people come on the front, that that spirit of adventure and
that sort of community persists throughout these events. Scott
Witthoff : 11:56 The one, one thing I really love about Dirty
Kanza, the entire town of Emporia, they'd come out for it and they
have, they have all these tents and pop up food vendors and it's
neat to see all the, the winners, they come back out and they cheer
people on until midnight. I mean, it's a party music going and I
just think that's wonderful that it's neat to see the winners that
come back down and cheer every last finisher. Craig Dalton: 12:25
Those guys have put together such an incredible event and I think,
you know, for those of us who may not have spent a lot of time in
Kansas to be able to go and participate in an event that has such a
legacy in the sport and see how it's done. Right, and see how the
community comes behind it. I think it's like a great model for, you
know, some of the newer vans to aspire to. Scott Witthoff : 12:48
In Europe is now taking note of what dirty Kansas has done and
they're putting on races over in Europe now. Based on that, the
formula that works for dirty cancer, like what is it that makes a
great race. I think we're seeing that everywhere people are putting
on amazing races. Craig Dalton: 13:07 Are there some other events
that you've done in the past or hope to do in the future that
you're excited about? Scott Witthoff : 13:13 You know, I missed, I
was signed up for Rebecca's private Idaho last year. Everyone says
I've never heard one negative thing about that event. Rebecca does
an amazing job putting on a neat reason. I want to. I signed up for
it, so for this year? Yeah. Great. Yeah, so I'm excited. Grinduro
up in Quincy is another incredible event. Craig Dalton: 13:36 And
what did you think about that format? So for those of you guys who
don't know, with grinder row, they had four time segments, so
essentially you can ride as slow or fast as you want in between
those segments, but the only timing that counts is in the segments.
Do you like that format? Scott Witthoff : 13:52 Yeah, I really. I
liked it because you're riding, you grab a group of friends and you
ride pretty chill and then it's all bets are off. He'd go for it
and he tried to smash one another up sometime segment. I usually
get dropped pretty much in the parking lot. I'm, I'm already off
the back early on that first hill climb. But you get an opportunity
later to shine maybe on a descent, I'm maybe on the flap tt or
there's four different types that in the last one is the single
track. Yeah. Which was a lot of fun. Craig Dalton: 14:29 It made
for some interesting sort of decisions about equipment because each
one of those sections of taking something different. Scott Witthoff
: 14:37 Yeah. I think, I mean if I had a lot of bikes at my
disposal, I would choose a hard tail on that course because that
lasts. Single track looks. Those guys on mountain bikes had a
blast. Craig Dalton: 14:49 Yeah, it's funny. I was riding with a
mutual friend of ours, David Belden, and we came to the same
conclusion like our hard tail mountain bike overall would have been
a faster vehicle to cover the terrain, although we both agreed like
being on gravel bikes was a fun part of the experience, so we'll
we'll see next year if I go hard tail mountain biker or stick on
the on the gravel Finally I wanted to talk about an event that you
put on and that has a really great history. The Coast Ride while
it's not a gravel event, it certainly classifies as adventure
cycling. Can you tell us a little bit about the origin of the Coast
Ride and really what it is for people who aren't familiar with it?
Scott Witthoff : 15:34 The Coast Ride, you know, everybody asks
where did it start, and I honestly feel like it's been happening
for as long as I've been alive. It just everybody rides in San
Francisco. The old days they wrote San Francisco to Santa Barbara
to San Diego. Greg Lemond the are stories of Greg on riding with
his dad down the coast and I think he called the coast ride, but
there are a bunch of triathletes I want to say ron early nineties
that started it. They started here in San Francisco when they road
down to San Diego and that was kinda their kickoff to the year and
I started joining them 15 years ago where we would all carry a
backpack. That's how we got down the coast where you'd carry
backpacks and some years it was raining and some years are
beautiful. Then in 2005 I had wasn't able to ride it, so I drove my
car. I want it to be a part of it. So I drove it, started raining
and everybody said, Hey Scott, do you mind if I put my backpack in
your car? I was like, yeah, absolutely. Throw it in so I carried
about 20 bags and that was the end of self supported. I ruined it
for everybody. So ever since 2005 now we've had sag support. We
only ride to Santa Barbara. It's a three day bike ride, but each
day's I'm about a 125 miles and we stay in hotels along the way.
Craig Dalton: 17:05 Yeah, it was my first version. I finally got to
go on it this year. I loved it that I'd written the coast before by
myself or with friends and there is something liberating about just
heading south and running all day long and the camaraderie and just
the basic organization that that you've been able to kind of
cobbled together with other people involved has been really great
for the cycling community. I mean obviously I know dozens of people
who every year it's on their calendar today. Speaker 2: 17:33 Yeah,
it's a neat. What I love about it is it, it really brings groups of
people together. You know, this is a no frills bike ride like we
don't. We have pizza at the end of the day, some sag stops, but
it's really. You're just responsible for getting yourself down the
coast and we'll take your bags and the whole goal is just, you
know, I love seeing people meet other fellow cyclists. We had a
couple get engaged a couple of years ago, which is pretty wonderful
that they pulled over and proposed to his wife, so that was pretty
neat. Craig Dalton: 18:10 That's great. And that's. There's a
website. It's thecoastride.org dot, correct. Yeah. For those who
you want to check it out, definitely take a look. There's some
great pictures there. Talks about the routes. I mean obviously you
can go out there and do it on your own with a backpack and Scott
said, but if it makes sense in your January training plan,
definitely come out there and check that out because the highway
one down the coast, it just, it can't be beat. It's a world class
place to ride your bike ever. Scott Witthoff : 18:35 We're truly
lucky where we live to get and we've had some wet years people have
done. Those are scarred and they won't come back to the coast ride
because it's three very long days in the saddle, but if you have
good weather like we've had last few years, it's pretty special.
Craig Dalton: 18:50 Yeah, absolutely. Well, Scott, I appreciate the
time today. It was great to learn a little bit more about your
background and, and Midwest gravel riding. I think it's very
illustrative. Um, as we as listeners start to explore, like where
should I go? What should I put on my bucket list to gravel riding?
I think he gave us a few good options. I'll put links to all the
events that you mentioned in the podcast and uh, if you're
comfortable, I'll put a link to your strava profile if people want
to check out where you've been riding. Yeah. And I'll also post if
you could send over one of your favorite travel routes. Absolutely.
I'll post that as well. Thanks for. Thanks for having me.
Absolutely. Craig Dalton: 19:35 It was great to talk to Scott this
week and let a little bit more about Dirty Kanza in The Coast ride
and some of the other events he's participated in. I'll post notes
to everything we've talked about in the show notes, and as always,
if you have any questions or suggestions, follow us on instagram
@thegravelride or shoot me a note at Craig@thegravelride.bike

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About the Podcast

The Gravel Ride is a cycling podcast where we discuss the people, places and products that define modern gravel cycling. We will be interviewing athletes, course designers and product designers who are influencing the sport. We will be providing information on where to ride, what to ride and how to stay stoked on gravel riding.